New Zealand's Biological Heritage – a National Science Challenge
Published: 25 February 2014 - by Andrew Trevelyan
Landcare Research and Plant & Food Research are leading the development of a proposal for the New Zealand’s Biological Heritage national science challenge
Landcare Research and another Crown research institute, Plant & Food Research are leading the development of a proposal for one of the New Zealand Government’s ten National Science Challenges: New Zealand’s Biological Heritage.
The research undertaken in this Challenge will be designed to protect and manage New Zealand’s biodiversity, improve biosecurity and enhance the country’s resilience to harmful organisms.
There are four workstreams to the development of the proposal, which is due to be submitted to the Government by 28 April 2014.
With a broad range of stakeholder organisations being consulted over the proposal, the New Zealand Biological Heritage website has been established to help keep interested parties up to date with developments.
New Zealand’s Biological Heritage was one of ten National Science Challenges announced by the Government last year. The challenges have been designed to allow more strategic science investment with the aim of delivering major and enduring benefit for New Zealand.
What are the National Science Challenges?
The National Science Challenges are designed to take a more strategic approach to the government's science investment by targeting a series of goals, which, if they are achieved, would have major and enduring benefits for New Zealand. They provide an opportunity to align and focus New Zealand's research on large and complex issues by drawing scientists together from different institutions and across disciplines to achieve a common goal through collaboration.
Many of the issues facing New Zealand require new knowledge obtained through science and research. The Government has launched the Challenges to provide a means to address the most pressing of these complex issues. The Challenges will seek answers to questions of national significance to New Zealand by focusing effort and providing additional focus on key areas. The Challenges provide an opportunity to identify which issues are most important to New Zealand and will allow Government to take a targeted, cross-government approach to addressing them.
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